


The Transcendence Scrapbook (Or Dipper's Life as an Ageless Dream Demon)

by DragonThistle



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Gravity Falls - Transcendence AU, I say major character death because of the usual passage of time, Transcendence AU, also graphic depictions of violence because alcor is not to be messed with, feels alert you will cry, unconnected one shots of various length
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-01
Updated: 2015-04-21
Packaged: 2018-02-27 17:29:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 26
Words: 17,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2701304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonThistle/pseuds/DragonThistle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Transcendence AU. Various tiny one-shots that are unconnected, of different lengths, and in no particular order. They're kind of silly, kind of sad, and might conflict with canon but here they are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Novels

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve been wanting to write something for Transcendence AU for a long while now.  
> No. You don’t understand. I love this AU. It breaks my heart and makes me smile at the same time. I will kill for this AU.
> 
> So here’s a small collection of bits and bobs and odds and ends that I think about sometimes. These are like tiny, individual one shots and word prompts that aren’t connected to each other, just various little bits all on their own. They’re in no particular order and are kind of silly and might conflict with canon but yeah.
> 
> I made myself cry with some of these.

Dipper had found her hiding place again.

How he’d gotten in it was another matter altogether because she’d _warded_ the damn thing. But the fact of the matter was that Dipper had found where Mabel had hidden those Twin Star novels and had trashed them. Again.

At least he’d been creative about it this time. He’d carefully arranged the ashes of the burnt pages into a large, angry “NO” in the middle of the floor. Well that was going to be fun to clean up. And she was going to have to go out and buy the entire series again.

But that was okay. It was worth blowing the money on those trashy romance novels just to see the look on her brother’s face when he caught someone reading them. Especially when she made a point to read them in front of him.

Maybe this time she would read parts of it aloud.

 


	2. Morning

The first time Dipper managed to become corporeal was 9am on a lazy Saturday morning soon after the twins had returned home from Gravity Falls.

Despite the fact that Mabel had talked to him nearly constantly and despite the fact that Dipper was clearly _there_ , Mister and Missus Pines were doubtful, worried, and scared. Even Stan had done little to persuade them. So they’d taken their daughter home (their daughter who was talking to thin air, their daughter who was insisting that their son was sitting in the car seat beside her, their daughter who they were sure had been damaged by the happenings in Gravity Falls) and had tried to pretend that everything was normal and okay and nothing had changed.

Which was amazingly difficult when the supernatural now roamed happily and freely across the globe.

Still they somehow managed to keep things straight for the small bit of the summer that remained before school began.

Until 9am on Saturday morning.

The Pines family was in the kitchen; Missus Pines making another cup of coffee, her husband at his seat leafing through the paper and munching on toast, and Mabel kicking her feet in the air as she stirred her cereal in her bowl.

There was a soft “pop” and quite suddenly Dipper Pines was sitting in the chair beside his sister. He looked startled, a bit frazzled, and not a little bit surprised. Then he blinked his gold and black eyes, lifted a hand, and snatched the last piece of toast off his father’s plate.

Mister Pines looked up and the newspaper was instantly forgotten.

Missus Pines looked around and dropped her mug to the floor where it shattered.

Mabel glanced up and said through a mouthful of cereal, “Hey, bro-bro.”

Dipper grinned and showed a mouthful of sharp teeth, rising a foot off his chair, “Mabel! Mabel I did it! I’m solid! Look!” And he waved the piece of toast in front of her face.

His twin looked up again, gave him a once over, and then let out a shriek of delight. Another shriek followed soon after from her mother.

Mister Pines snatched up his daughter and wife and dove out of the kitchen. Dipper stared after them in shock. Blue fire flickered around the edges of his form. Then, with a fuzz of static and a rush of air, he vanished again.

The temperature in the room was several degrees colder than it should have been.


	3. Wings

The first time the triplet’s experienced a thunderstorm, they were frightened. They were small things, barely five years old, and even though they put on a brave front and Acacia put up her fists like a fighter when the thunder cracked overhead they all dove under their blankets in a shivering pile.

When the thunder came again, bigger, louder, rattling the tiny shack for all it was worth, they ran screaming into their parents’ bedroom and clawed their way under those covers instead. Henry and Mabel had found themselves with three very frightened children wedge between them, their hands over their ears, their eyes squeezed shut, little bodies trembling.

“Aw, don’t be scared,” Mabel murmured sleepily as Henry shifted and rubbed at his eyes, trying to get his arm free of a furiously trembling Hank, “It’s just noise and light, crumblecakes, it can’t hurt you in here. Don’t worry, Daddy will protect you from the big scary—“

“ **WHO DARES FRIGHTEN MY NIBLINGS!** ”

Mabel sighed as Dipper literally came roaring into existence right in time with a crash of thunder and a blaze of lightning that lit the room like a firecracker. He was in full demon mode, a shadow darker than black, molten gold brick patterns shifting across his body, eyes ablaze and blue fire spilling from his fingers. When he saw the glare that Mabel was sending his way (and the one Henry was giving the wall a bit to his left) and the way the triplets were curled under the covers in fear, he instantly shifted forms,

“S-sorry, I didn’t—I just sensed they were scared and—is everything okay?”

“They’re just frightened of the thunderstorm, that’s all.” Mabel answered, stroking Willow’s head and murmuring to her, trying to get her to calm down, “And your grand entrance didn’t help any.”

Dipper shrugged sheepishly and then glanced towards the window. Another crackling blaze of lightning and ear-splitting boom of thunder rattled the shack. He _could_ just tell the storm to stop…but that wouldn’t help the kids grow and learn. Besides, he knew what it was like to be frightened of storms; they’d used to scare him too when he was very little.

“Hey…” He whispered, popping onto the physical plane and drifting to the edge of the bed to settle down on it. Mabel shifted back a bit so Dipper could see the triplets easier, “Hey little niblings, it’s your Uncle Dipper. You’re not scared of the storm are you?”

“No!” Came Acacia’s defiant retort from where she’d smothered her face into her father’s chest.

Dipper chuckled and spread out his little black wings. And then spread them out further. And then further still. They swallowed the room, wrapping around the bed like great curtains of darkness, and muffled the sounds of the storm until they were almost non-existent. The triplets peered up warily, eyeing the dark wings that surrounded the bed, and even Henry gave them a curious look. Dipper smiled softly and breathed out. As he did so, little pin-points of light began to appear across his wings, only a few at first but then more and more until his wings were like a dome of the sky, filled with stars. The milky way stretched from one side to the other, a river of glittering light, and the constellations of the triplets were dotted amongst the stars. The light reflected softly back onto the bed, sparkling slightly like sunlight off the surface of the water.

The triplets looked around with wide eyes and Mabel smiled. She looked over at Henry who was smiling too and pretending he was annoyed with Dipper for being in their room, on their bed, in the middle of the night.

Later, when they had fallen asleep and the storm had passed, Dipper withdrew his wings and phased out of the physical plane with a tired sigh. Maybe after he’d had a good rest he would capture some stars in a bottle for the niblings.

Maybe one day he would take them out on his wings and show them what a true storm was like.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all I'm sharing for now. Depending on the response this gets, I might most more. I have a lot more. But I'm hoarding them. Ask nicely and I might share.


	4. Upside Down

The phrase “damn it, Dipper” was not uncommon in the Pines household.

More often than not it occurred when the demon would pop into existence and startle the ever living shit out of anyone who wasn’t ready for it.

But sometimes he had a tendency to bring work home with him. Like the time he’d somehow managed to get a pack of hellhound puppies to follow him back to the house and they’d pissed hell fire on _everything_. Or the time he’d forgotten himself and tried to give the triplets bear traps as presents. Or, worse still, when he’d come back from a summons angry and furious and covered in blood and bits of flesh with what was possibly someone’s _tooth_ stuck in his hair.

Those were bad days, days that no one talked about. Days that tended to drive Dipper to hide somewhere for weeks before he felt he could come back.

Today, though, was not one of those days.

Today, when Henry walked into sitting room with a cup of coffee in one hand and his book in the other, he found his children floating upside down from the ceiling. They were laughing and snorting and getting red in the face and waving their arms and wriggling around like worms on a hook.

“Damn it, Dipper…” The red head sighed and sank onto the couch.

There was a sensation like fireworks and comets across the sky that might have been Dipper laughing.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was promised fifty cookies for updates. Where are my cookies.


	5. Play

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Based on an ask on the Transcendence AU blog (http://transcendence-au.tumblr.com/post/104164083763/one-of-the-triplets-finds-dippers-old-camera-and)

Dipper didn’t quite understand what was going on at first.

He’d popped back into the house after a long day of summoning and investigating a drifting moon, tired and looking for familiar company. What he’d found was three giggling triplets, nearly falling over each other with laughter when they saw him.

“What?” He asked, frowning, “Do I have something on my suit? Is there moon dust on it? Oh god, don’t tell me one of those cult kids managed to stick a ‘KICK ME’ sign on my back!”

Hank shook his head, grabbed his sisters, and darted out of the room. Dipper stared after them, still plucking at his suit. Then he shook his head in wonderment and drifted off to find Mabel. She was in the kitchen, busily preparing the evening meal, and happily smacked his hand when he tried to stick his finger in the mashed potatoes,

“No sampling! You’ll spoil your appetite and get your gross demon cooties all over everything.”

Dipper scowled playfully at her, “You’re as bad as when we were kids. Speaking of kids, what’s up with the niblings?”

“No idea.” His sister replied cheerfully, “They were playing around in the attic loft today and when they came back they were all giggly. They might have gotten jinxed with a laughter charm or something. A lot of our old stuff is still sitting around up there.”

Dipper huffed in irritation, “You let my niblings get jinxed?” The glare Mabel sent him made the demon backtrack, “I—yeah, no, sure. They probably just—kids, you know. They laugh at everything. Haha. Ha. I’ll just. Go. Now. See what they’re up to. Yep.” And he darted out of the room before his sister could say anything.

The triplets weren’t hard to find. He could always find them, little stars burning at the edges of his vast consciousness. They were out in the yard, playing around the mailbox, muttering to one another, flipping up the red arm thingie (even Dipper, in all his infinite wisdom, didn’t know what the red arm thingie was called) and opening and closing it and making all sorts of strange noises.

The demon drifted closer, curious, and they all stopped playing for a moment when his shadow fell across them, “Hey, niblets, whatcha up to?”

The three of them shared a secret glance and then giggled. Willow crouched beside the mailbox and Hank and Acacia took a few steps back. Acacia had a notebook and pen and began to rapidly click the pen while Hank desperately fought to keep a straight face.

“Uh, I dunno, what should we ask it? The exact time and date of my death?” She was dropping her voice, making a mockery of a male octave, “The meaning of life? Who wrote Journal Number Three?”

“Who wrote the Journals! Who wrote the Journals!” Hank shouted, voice shaking with laughter.

Dipper’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. This was all sounding rather familiar to him…

It clicked.

His cheeks turned red, the tips of his pointed ears got hot, and his little wings fluttered with a nervous energy, “M-m-my—you found my—but that—HOW COULD YOU!?”

The three children burst into laughter, falling over themselves and rolling on the ground,

“Uncle Dipper you were such a DWEEB!” Acacia shrieked, tears in her eyes, “And noodley! Mom was right you had noodle arms!”

“How long did it take for the GOOBER to fade off your forehead!?” Hank wheezed, curled on the ground, “And how long did you have to wait on the roof for Grunkle Stan to stop chasing you!?”

“Where are the rest of the tapes, Uncle Dips?” Willow was breathlessly with laughter, sagging against the side of the mailbox, her face flushed pink, “We wanna see all your ‘Guides to the Unexplained’!”

“Yeah! Yeah, Uncle Dipper! Where are the rest of the tapes!”

“We wanna see! We wanna see!”

“NOPE I BURNED THEM THEY ARE GONE FOREVER!” Dipper barked, face beet red and the collar of his suit hot around his neck, “WE WILL NEVER SPEAK OF THIS AGAIN!”

So of course, at dinner, Stan and Mabel were mocking him endlessly.


	6. Message

The cultists had been preparing for this summon very, very carefully. They knew of Alcor the Dreambender’s temperament, they had suffered under it once already, and they were not eager to repeat the experience. So this time they carefully drew their circle, used expensive but unscented candles, and were prepared with a freezer full of ice cream.

“Are we ready?” Asked one who might have been a leader given the sash wrapped around his ceremonial robes.

“Yes, sir.” Answered another cultist, stepping back from the summon circle.

“Places!” Called the leader, “All set? Begin!”

They began to chant, their voices rising together in an ominous Latin swell of power. The candles around the circle, the only lights in the room, dimmed. And then they flared brightly, spitting sparks up to the ceiling, the flames turning blue.

The robed figures around the circle all looked up eagerly, excitement showing under the shadows of their hoods. Stars erupted in the summoning circle, leaving behind thick black smoke. The smoke condensed, compacting itself into a solid shape. Then, with a soft but cheerful ‘POP’, something that was clearly _not_ Alcor the Dreambender appeared in the circle.

It was a black, fleshy-looking, boxy creature with little narrow bat wings that fluttered frantically in the circle. There was a single golden eye blinking beadily at them and below that was a wide speaker where a mouth should have been.

The cult members stared.

A cheerful beep came from the speaker and than a sugar sweet, glittery female voice said,

“ _Hello there summoner! You’ve reached Alcor the Dreambender aka The Twin Star aka Sir Dippingsauce! He can’t come to your summons at the moment but will try to be with you shortly! Please hold! Your summons are important to us!_ ”

And with that, said voice launched into a slightly off-key rendition of Disco Girl.

The cultists stared. And stared. Some of them started snickering, failing to hold back their laughter. Others were quietly flipping through books, trying to find what had gone wrong. The leader was slumped in front of the circle, slack-jawed with shock and amazement and not a little bit of disgust.

When Disco Girl changed to Don’t Start Un-Believing, he might have started crying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoiler alert, I don't actually know if there was every a canon design for the answering machine. Apologies if this is incorrect.


	7. Red

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more for the road, folks. This was my last day of college, I am officially done with college, and my access to the internet has now dropped to basically nothing. So if I don't update for a while, that's why. Hopefully this will satisfy you lovely for a while. Thanks for sticking around <3

It wasn’t hard to make Alcor the Dreambender angry. It wasn’t hard to make his temper spark. It wasn’t at all hard to get on his bad side.

Getting him to actually lose his temper was something else entirely.

But it happened.

Once in a great while it happened.

And those were the days people tended to remember that Alcor the Dreambender was also the Twin Star, the King of Dreams, the Lord of Nightmares, the Master of the Mindscape, the Bloodless Demonking. The Comet of Lost Souls. The Dream Eater. The Shadow of Nightmares Past. He Who Drinks The Fear of His Enemies. A hundred other names that came and went as the times did.

It was those days that he sometimes forgot he was Dipper and was just Alcor and all he saw was red.

Something would _snap_. It would just break inside him and _no._ No. He would not accept the world as it was. He was a veritable _god_ he could do as he pleased and this world was his plaything and it would _bend to his will_. Fuck these puny mortals and their wishes and how dare they. _How dare they use people against him_.

Human sacrifice. Animal sacrifice. Using children. Any of these were enough to make him lose his temper. Or at least put him on the brink.

But simply hint at using his family against him and Alcor would make it apocalypse now on whoever had crossed him.

He’d taken people apart piece by piece, peeled layers of skin away to reveal muscle beneath. And then peeled that away too. He’d stopped organs from functioning. He’d plucked eyes from skulls, wrenched tongues from mouths, carved curses into flesh, and ripped hearts from chests. He’d broken ribs, legs, arms, and spines. He’d removed limbs with barely a thought. He had slaughtered and killed and drank in the fear and the suffering like a drug, getting high on the power of it all.

And then, sometimes in shame of his actions, Alcor the Dreambender would hide. He would vanish for weeks without a whisper of his name being spoken.

Those were the days when he tried to remember he was still Dipper Pines. Somewhere amongst the unfathomable energies to the universe and the twistings of the mindscape he was _still Dipper Pines_. Those were the days when he needed to be grounded, when he needed the souls of the people he loved the most.

Those were the the days when the people of Gravity Falls whispered that a mournful ghost would haunt the graves of the Pines family and play a sad, bitter song that broke the hearts of all who heard it.

Those were the days when Dipper wished with all his heart he could grant his own desires.


	8. Rainbow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look guys I drove fifteen minutes into town for you HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Henry might not have been able to see Dipper like Mabel or the triplets could but he’d learned to sense when his brother-in-law (demon-in-law?) was in the room.

Whether Dipper knew it or not, he had a rather subtle affect on the world around him. Like the cold spots ghosts sometimes left behind, Dipper’s presence was sometimes announced with a rise or drop in temperature if he wasn’t paying attention. And even if he’d been on guard enough to stop that, he could never completely stop the little bursts of feelings he gave off.

To a truly observant person (such as Henry), it was easy to pick out the feelings in the air that didn’t quite seem to have a place. To the casual person, these feelings would more than likely go unnoticed or the mind would sort it out into a memory somewhere that could be related to said sensation.

Henry’s favorites were when Dipper was happy. Not just because he wanted Dipper to be happy but because the happiness was almost infectious. It certainly influenced the triplets and Henry couldn’t blame them. When Dipper was in a room and he was bursting with happiness, it was like sunshine. Fireworks in the distance, the sweet taste of well deserved ice cream, a spring rain, blooming flowers, spring time and newness and the clearest, bluest skies in the world. That was Dipper’s happiness.

His laughter was bubbles in the sun, rainbows made on summer days with the hose, splashing in the shallows. The tastes and sensations of the glorious freedoms of summer and spring, the unbridled joy of simply living. Being in a room where Dipper Pines was laughing made you feel young again.

On the other hand, his sorrow was a crushing weight.

Henry had felt this weight only twice and it was heavy and cold and hard to bear. It was a rainstorm that pounded down, great walls of icy water the drenched everything. It was a boulder coated in ice, an iron chain that dragged and caught and made it difficult to move. Dipper’s sorrow and his loss and his despair dragged to the surface memories of things unwanted, things that brought tears to the eyes, things that made the world seem grey. Grey. Grey was the right word for it, a life-sucking grey that drained the life out of everything.

Henry Pines did not like to see his brother-in-law sad.

But nor did he like him angry.

That anger had never been directed at Henry himself but simply being in the same room as a furious Dipper was suffocating. It was heat and fire and smoke, choking and clogging the throat and constricting the lungs. It was a prickly heat, like white-hot needles sliding into flesh, forests burning to the ground as animals fled in terror. Dipper was hellfire when he was angry. Hellfire and judgement and black and red and sparks that burned the very air. Dipper in a rage was murder and death and burning. An angry Dipper was a vengeful, spitfire demon that was to be avoided.

And then there was fear.

Only once had Henry truly felt what it was like to be in Dipper’s presence when he was afraid.

It had been like drowning.

Anger might have been fire but surely fear was water. A claustrophobic tidal wave of shadows that swallowed one whole, chewed them up, and spat them back out with a sour sneer. Fear was being alone in the dark, fear was tasting the tang of iron in your mouth and knowing it was yours, fear was the cold night in the dead of winter. The absolute terror that Henry had felt simply feeling and understanding Dipper’s fear had driven him from the room. It had been too much, even for him.

There was more, of course. Love being a warm, soft blanket that smelled of home. Curiosity a twang of old guitar strings. Pride a swelling like a great hot air balloon that felt fit to burst.

Even later when Henry was able to see Dipper and could see the smile on his face and hear the laughter for himself, he still looked for those sensations. Still remembered the tingle on his skin and the back of his mind from the fireworks of Dipper’s happiness. Because those feelings were the best feelings and it made Henry Pines smile knowing that everything was going to be all right.


	9. Teenager

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I might have forgotten about this a little bit. Oops.  
> Also not having internet means I can't keep up to date on what's happening in the Transcendence fandom so I've run out of steam and ideas. Guys feel free to leave me links to fun headcanons, pictures, or prompts in the comments, they're very helpful. Also fun.

\-------

When Mabel was fourteen going on fifteen and Dipper was fourteen going on ageless, they both realized that birthdays were becoming strange affairs and that Dipper was starting to forget what they meant at all.

When Mabel was fifteen and Dipper was a number that was becoming meaningless, Mabel realized that her twin was no longer following her to school. She didn’t see him hovering near the ceiling in classes, she didn’t see him trying to peek into the girl’s locker room, she didn’t see him chasing stray basketballs in gym class. Turns out being an omnipresent demon meant school had sort of become irrelevant.

When Mabel was sixteen and Dipper had just stopped bothering to keep track all together, they moved back to Gravity Falls because neither of them could take the looks and mutters of their parents any longer.

When Mabel was seventeen and Dipper was hovering somewhere between immortal and timeless, a cult vanished off the face of the planet after sacrificing a child to summon Alcor the Dreambender. No one heard from them again and the Pines twins never spoke about it. But Dipper could be found days later crying in dark corners of the shack.

When Mabel was eighteen and was graduating high school and was walking across the stage to get her diploma, fireworks erupted over the stage and scared the shit out of the crowd. No one saw where they came from but Mabel smiled and waved at the air above the crowd.

When Mabel was nineteen and Dipper spent a whole year trying to remember what time was, bad things happened and things got twisted and dark and no one wanted to think about it. Dipper liked to pretend it never happened, even if a part of him was incredibly gleeful about the idea of finally, finally owning a soul.

Time inched along.

Dipper could count the seconds as they passed, even if he forgot what seconds were sometimes.

When Mabel was twenty-two and Dipper was pretending time actually mattered to him, Mabel fell in love with a redhead that was was eighty percent freckles and twenty percent knees and elbows.

When Mabel was twenty-seven and Dipper had given up all pretext of bothering with time, three little stars came into their lives.

And suddenly time seemed relevant again because Dipper wanted to spend every second of his existence being the best uncle the world could offer.


	10. Reckless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from the Transcendence AU Blog that I lost in the depths of said blog, sorry OPer. If this is your prompt, let me know! Anyway, I thought I’d try something a little different this time. I’m a bit rusty at this so forgive any OOCness.

You’ve heard about Alcor the Dreambender.

Seriously, who _hasn’t_ heard about Alcor the Dreambender?

Dumbies, that’s who.

Probably Steve hasn’t heard about Alcor the Dreambender ‘cause he’s the biggest poophead of them all. You hope he hasn’t heard about him. Because he’s going to be hearing about him soon enough.

You’re not supposed to be doing this, there’s an age limit on who’s allowed to summon. An age limit that nobody follows. You’re not even supposed to _know_ how to do this. But you have a big brother and your big brother is cool and brags about his own summons all the time. So you know how to do it.

You’re being very careful. You’ve heard about Alcor the Dreambender. He’s the stuff of nightmares. Which is perfect for what you want to do to Steve and his stupid friends. Not so perfect for you if you mess this up. So you have to be careful. You’ve been practicing the words and the drawings for weeks now. And enduring all the snide remarks and hits and trips while you’re at it.

But it’ll be worth it in the end.

Ooooh, but it’ll all be worth it.

You start the summons.

You’re alone in the house, no one’s going to bother you. Mom and Dad are at the movies or something and big brother snuck out to hang with his friends instead of babysitting you like he’s supposed to. You won’t tattle-tale on him though. Then they might find out what you’re up to and you don’t want to get in trouble too.

The flames on the electric candles you’re using turn blue and the light makes the room seem darker. Black smoke billows in the middle of your carefully drawn circle, pushing at the edges, testing the boundaries. You’re a little scared now but this isn’t as bad as you’d thought it would be.

Then there’s a thundering crack and golden lightning splinters through the smoke. Another and another and another and they’re all slamming into each other, joining in the middle of the black smoke until they form a flaming, golden shape. It has wings and claws. The molten gold is sucked inwards with the smoke, black and gold meeting and blocking out the shape even more until Alcor the Dreambender is floating in your summoning circle, looking down at you with gold and black eyes.

You’re trying really hard not to cry or pee your pants. Or both.

“ **Why do you summon Alcor the Dreambender?** ”

His voice makes you think of a snake.

“I—I—I w-want—I—“ You have to stop, find your voice, swallow past the lump of fear in your throat. Alcor watches you quietly, his arms crossed, simply floating there. You try again,

“I want you to make the kids at school stop bullying me!”

He blinks and it’s strange, a black film sliding over his eyes and then sliding back again. He uncrosses his arms and lowers himself to the floor, “ **Kids picking on you at school?** ” He repeats curiously, “ **What could kids your age possibly do to each other?** ”

You hesitate. You’re not a tattle-tale.

“ **It’s not tattle-taling if you’re telling a demon.** ” He has this funny little smile on his face and it doesn’t show his scary shark teeth. He actually looks nice.

You find yourself telling him everything. You tell him how they trip you and make you drop all your stuff. You tell him how they call you names and make you feel stupid and like a baby. You tell him how they steal your things and don’t give them back, how they say if you tell a teacher then they’ll hit you and tell everyone you’re a tattle-tale, and how no one will help you because they don’t want to get bullied too.

Alcor the Dreambender listens quietly and by the time you’re done you’re sniffling and rubbing tears from your eyes. You’re mad that you’re crying in front of Alcor and that makes you cry more and that makes you angrier.

“ **Hey, kid, don’t be itchy.** ” You look up and the demon in the summoning circle no longer looks quite so…demon-y. He looks like a person almost, with real skin and brown hair. His ears are still pointy and his eyes are still black and gold but he’s wearing a suit and he’s smiling and he actually looks nice.

“Sorry.” You say and you’re so upset. You wanted to be cool, just like you’re big brother.

“ **You’re cool, kid, trust me.** ” Alcor says. He’s crouched in the circle, down to your level, arms draped over his knees, head tilted to the side like a dog when it hears a funny noise, “ **Your brother’s never summoned me. But you did. And that’s really cool.** ”

“I-it is?”

“ **Yeah! I’m Alcor the Dreambender! I’m the Twin Star! I’m the coolest guy you’ll ever meet! I’m Doctor Funtimes!** ”

“Uh…”

“ **Okay, forget that last part.** ” He waves a hand through the air, trailing sparks and you can’t help but smile at the theatrics, “ **Look, you want my help, right? You want those kids to stop bullying you?** ”

“Yeah! Can you scare ‘em away for me! Or—or do some kind of cool demon-y thing at them!”

He laughs and it sounds like thunder and bells and makes your chest feel fuzzy.

“ **I’ll spook them _once_ for you, kid,** ” He says kindly, “ **But after that you need to stand up for yourself, ‘k?** ”

“But…but everyone says that!” You shout and you feel hurt inside because this is Alcor the Dreambender and he was supposed to _help you_. But he’s just like every other grown-up, “Dad said to ‘stand up for myself’ but I’d get in trouble if I hit Steve back and he just makes fun of me if I tell him to leave me alone and I’M NOT A TATTLE-TALE!”

You’re trying really, really, really hard not to start crying again. You’re not a baby.

Alcor is staring at you. He tilts his head the other way and then pushes off the floor so he’s floating in the air again, “ **I used to get picked on too, ya’ know.** ”

It’s your turn to stare, “You? But…but you’re a big scary demon guy!”

He laughs again and this time it’s like distant thunder and drums, “ **I wasn’t always this cool, kid, trust me. I used to be really small and weak and everyone walked all over me. I got bullied a lot because I was different and whenever I stood up for myself, I just got bullied even more. But you know what I did?** ”

“Did you shoot them with lightning bolts and fire!?”

Alcor shakes his head, “ **Nah, I couldn’t do that back then. I tried to hide it from everyone. I tried to take care of it by myself and I didn’t tell anyone what was happening. My sis—someone I’m close to found out though. And next time those guys that were being mean tried to come at me, she stood behind me.** ” He looks down at you, hands in the pockets of his shiny black suit, and he looks kind of like he got caught taking cookies before dinner,

“ **See, it doesn’t matter how strong you are if you’re alone. Every problem seems a lot bigger when you’re by yourself. What you need are people who will support you no matter what. You need friends who will be there for you when the bullies come around.** ”

“But all my friends are scared of Steve and his friends too…”

“ **That’s okay. You can be scared. It’s all right to be scared. I get scared sometimes too. But if you can be scared together, then you can be brave together too. People can support each other.** ” He leans down with a grin that shows his sharp teeth but not in a mean way and whispers all secretively, “ **I bet if Steve was by himself he’d be too scared to bully you.** ” He leans back again and there’s something about him that reminds you of a cat and a mouse, “ **You get it, kid?** ”

You think about it.

You think about Steve and his friends, you think about your friends. And you realize Steve only picks on you when he’s with his friends and you’re alone. And you look up at Alcor with a slightly watery smile and he smiles back and you feel pretty good.

Except…

“Are you still going to scare Steve for me though?”

The Dreambender laughs again. The electric candles sputter and one goes out with a sharp pop and the room shakes a little, “ **Sure thing, kid! I’ll scare this jerk for…hm…** ” He sniffs, tilting his head this way and that, twisting around in the circle before looking back at you, “ **You gimme that candy you’re hiding on the bookshelf and I’ll scare the pants off this Steve guy for you!** ”

It’s the last of your Halloween candy but you don’t care. You scurry over to the shelf, push some books out of the way, and take out the candy bars you’d hidden from your brother. Alcor takes them eagerly and immediately eats one. The others he puts in his suit where they apparently vanish. Then he rubs his hands together, making sparks sputter into the air. There’s a grin on his face now and he looks hungry, like a wolf, and he’s scary again and you’re remembering why he’s Alcor the Dreambender.

“ **Don’t you worry about a thing, kid. Next time this Steve guys tries to get you, he’s going to regret it.** ”

Later that week, at school, Steve and his friends chase you behind the slides where the teachers can’t see and he tries to steal the chalk set your mom gave you.

He and his stupid friends get sent to the principle’s office for telling lies about demon sheep and blue fire balls.

When they were running away screaming and crying, you thought you could hear someone laughing.

It sounded like thunder and bells.

 


	11. Box

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while since I posted any of these so here's another one!

Centuries after Mabel Pines and generations after the triplets, Dipper Pines found himself in the woods surrounding Gravity Falls again. He would drift through the trees, find the memories of when he was young, of when he was human, and taste the times that had past and definitely not cry because he was Alcor the Dreambender and demons didn’t cry.

And then he would slide delicately through the walls of the Stanley Pines Memorial Library of the Supernatural and find the rooms where his family had laughed and cried and lived and he would drink in those memories too. He would bask in the glow of them, imaging for a second that he could hear them laughing and feel their touches and sense their souls around him.

And sometimes, if it was bad, if it was all too much for him, he would go up to their old attic room. He would find that loose floorboard where his bed used to be and he would gently pry it up just liked he used to when they were kids. And he would reach into the space there and pull out a box decorated with plastic jewels and far too much glitter and he would hold it to his chest and remember what Mabel felt like when he hugged her.

He would open the box and paw through the contents carefully preserved by his powers and delicately catalogue each item. The photographs (not enough of them, never enough of them), the trinkets (baubles that meant nothing to anyone but him), and the letters from his loved ones (the one from Wendy still smelled like tree sap, Henry’s was written on a print out no one had wanted from the library, Stan’s had a beer stain on it).

And last of all, he would take out the cassette tape. He would press it into the player and this time he would cry. He would curl in that attic space with his eyes closed and tears of blue fire trickling down his cheeks and pretending that he was okay and the world was okay. He would pretend he was twelve and human and his sister was sitting next to him and laughing. And as their voices poured from the old tape, reminding him over and over again that he was Dipper Pines and he was human, he would miss them with a ferociousness that nothing could match.

And when he was done he would lay in the sunbeams coming through the windows with his eyes closed and the box clutched to his chest and stretch himself across the world. And he would find Mabel’s soul again and in her (or his) dreams, he would sit with them.

And they would laugh just like they used to.


	12. Gift

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I posted two more before this one so if you missed them, go back and read them! Last one for the road!

The thing about Dipper was that sometimes the demon part of him got the better of him.

It wasn’t intentional and he usually never hurt anyone. But there were times when he got a bit. Extreme. For lack of a better term.

Henry had experienced this full force when Dipper had finally accepted that Mabel was in love with this man and, yeah, they were probably going to get married. Because Dipper trying to please and show affection was a bit like a cat leaving dead things on your doorstep. They meant well but, really, that dead vole was better off somewhere else.

Sometimes he got it right, more often than not remembering that hugs and slaps on the back were better than a head that was always screaming. But when Dipper got a little too excited he tended to overdo it.

That was why on the day of Henry’s wedding, the redhead woke up to find an entire cow carcass, freshly killed, on the lawn with a bow on it.

It was still better than what Dipper had done at the bachelor party.


	13. Chains

Sometimes someone got a summoning down perfectly.

And Dipper was usually okay with that.

Once in a very great while, though, that summoning included a binding.

And that was something Dipper was definitely not okay with.

It was hard to bind demons as they never used their true names, the names given to them or that they chose upon their creation. But there were ways around that, ways to thread spells together and trap and bind a demon, words of power that could tie them to a single individual. It was all temporary of course, at some point those bindings would fade or the demon would find a way to break them. But while they existed they were incredibly vexing.

One evening, Dipper popped back from a summons practically vibrating with anger. Mabel took one look at him and saw why.

There were chains. They were clamped tightly around his wrists and ankles and neck, lashed around his shoulders and chest, wrapping around him and dangling from his thin frame like so many iron snakes. They clanked as he moved, whispers of a heavy duty spell echoing amongst the rattling metal. His eyes glowed with rage as he curled onto the couch in the sitting room, bristling and furious and scowling at the wall in his anger.

It was a well done and powerful binding and even Mabel had to appreciate the spell crafting, even if it was her brother that was bound.

“How long?” She asked, sitting next to him on the couch and Dipper felt one, two, three little stars growing inside her and it made him all the angrier that he had to be bound _now_ of all times.

“About a month. Maybe two tops.” He ground out, arms crossed over his chest, “If I can break this sooner I will and then I’ll r **iP oUT tHe tHRoAT of thAT SoRrY baSTARD WHO THOUGHT HE COULD BIND ALCOR THE DRE—** “

“Dipper, you’re frightening the Lima Beans.”

Dipper, who’d been halfway into full demon mode, black etching its way across his form, wings spreading wide, blue fire rippling from between his teeth, froze. He glanced at Mabel, then at her belly. Then he sighed and lowered his arms, shifting back to normal.

“Sorry, sis. I got a bit carried away.”

Mabel smiled and reached over to ruffle his hair, “It’s okay, bro-bro. Now come on, cheer up. We’ve got a binding to crack!”

Dipper grinned, flashing his deadly sharp teeth, “Oh yes. Yes we do. And I can’t _wait_ to see the look on that summoner’s face once we get these chains off…”


	14. Deals are Easy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So a long while ago I crossed over Psychonauts with the Transcendence AU because it is both epic and terrifying. This was going to be a longer fic but I never finished it but I still like it so I’m throwing it in the Scrapbook.  
> For those of you who don’t know, Psychonauts is one of the greatest games ever and you should go buy it because it’s amazing. The main character is Razputin Aquato, ten year old psychic prodigy who ran away from his family circus to become an international, psychic, secret agent, a Psychonaut. Long story short, he did in fact become a Psychonaut. Now go play the game to get all the details. You won’t regret it, I promise.

Since the world had been turned on its head nearly a decade ago and everyone found out that monsters were _real_ and most of them were _nasty_ , things had been as close to insanity as any world outside the mental realm was going to get. But while there were demon hunters and monster hunters and cultists and exorcists and what not, the Psychonauts still held precedence when it came to matters of the mind.

So when it came down to psychics going mad, everyone cast a sideways glance at the now less-than-secret agency with it’s not-so-hidden summer camp and it’s quirky agents and gently shoved those of the unstable mind in their direction. It was better to let the organized insane ones handle the unorganized insane ones.

Razputin Aquato had been twelve when the Transcendence hit. It had swept the rug out from underneath all of them. Monsters were real. Demons were real. The stuff of nightmares actually existed. Of course growing up in the circus, Raz was able to accept it a bit easier than most, especially considering his family’s problem. But it was still hard. Missions had changed, people had changed, the world had changed. Rouge psychics sometimes joined cults or made deals in exchange for powers the Psychonauts could barely contain. The Psychonauts had set up strict new rules in order to deal with these new threats and the beasties that now lurked in the night.

One of them was that no Psychonaut was permitted to summon and/or make a deal with demonic forces.

A rule that Raz was about to break.

It had been a rather terrifying run in with a psychic who was incredibly skilled with aquakinesis. And had had those powers strengthened ten fold by water sprites who were happy to help in exchange for more river territory.

This probably would have an easy mission— _should_ have been an easy mission. But Raz’s family had a _thing_ about water. And after the twenty year old Psychonaut had nearly drowned (three times) during the battle and was left shivering and plagued by nightmares that took a team to clear out, he decided he’d had enough.

In the secret hours he had to himself, Raz had done something he did very little of. Research. He’d hunted down books, he’d dug through the internet, and he was even a little bit guilty of picking through a few cultist’s heads (what was the point of being first rate telepath if he didn’t get to use it?) It had taken several months of studying and planning but the young man finally thought he was ready.

He was going to summon a demon and he was going to make a deal to change not only his life but the lives of every member of his family as well. And possibly his girlfriend Lili’s but he wasn’t quite ready to think about that yet.

He was a Psychonaut. Making the world a better, safer place was what he did.

Besides, if he had to break a few rules for his family’s safety then so be it.

“Okay, Raz. You can do this. You’re a Psychonaut. No big deal.” He sucked in a deep breath, skinny chest swelling beneath his well loved uniform sweater before collapsing again as he let the breath out, “Just like we practiced. Yeah. Okay. Here we go.”

The young psychic crouched down in front of his carefully drawn summoning circle with the best, most expensive candle he could afford (bless Agent Vodello for helping him pick the out). He pushed his redish hair out of his face, cleared his throat, and began chanting.

The broken Latin was foreign and difficult and caught in his throat but he spoke each word carefully. He would not screw this up. He only had one chance. And the more Raz spoke, the more he felt the power building. It was like a wave, a giant wave, rearing up around him, building and building until eventually it would have to crash and destroy everything in its path.

And crash it did. Right into the center of the circle.

As Raz finished chanting, the candles erupted, shooting pillars of fire to the ceiling, and black smoke suddenly welled into the center of the circle. Raz swallowed, climbing unsteadily to his feet, but all noises were lost in the roaring, the rushing, and then the howling, dark, terrifying voice that suddenly echoed from the cloud of smoke,

“ **WHO DARES SUMMON ALCOR THE DREAMBENDER!** ”

Raz flinched, one hand automatically flying to his temple even as he ducked under the wave of pressure from the demon. He could feel it in his skull, in his brain, an overwhelming power that pressed him down, down, down. The young psychic sucked in shallow breaths, trying to reestablish his mental grip on the world, trying to shake off the sickening dizziness that came with the awesome rush of power from Alcor the Dreambender.

Meanwhile, the smoke in the circle had condensed, solidifying into the shape of human figure. A dark figure, like a living shadow, with angrily glowing golden eyes and an iridescent brick pattern that shimmered like molten gold. Great black wings stretched as far as they could within the confines of the summoning circle and blue fire wreathed the floor beneath the demon. He was as every bit as terrifying as the stories told.

Alcor looked down at Raz with a sort of bemused air, “ **A Psychonaut huh? I thought you had rules against summoning the likes of me.** ” His voice was a dangerous purr, a ripple of darkness that left a sour taste like black licorice on the back of the throat.

“Y-yeah, well. We can keep that between us.” Raz swallowed his stutter and straightened up, “I want to make a deal.”

A dark chuckle. The brick pattern on Alcor’s body rippled, the molten shimmer trickling through the lines as if it would bubble over and began dripping to the floor at any moment, “ **That’s funny. Really funny, kid. What does the Youngest Psychonaut Ever want from me? Can’t be fame, you’ve already got that. Power? No, you’re one of the most powerful psychics on the planet. Maybe he’s in love?** ” Raz’s face flushed and Alcor snickered, black lips peeling back to show a mouth full of tiny, razor sharp teeth. It looked like there were too many to actually fit in his mouth.

“I don’t want any of that.” Raz’s voice was solid and he was frowning over the blush in his cheeks, “I want you to break the curse that was cast on me and my family. I want you to break the Curse of the Galochios and free us from it. All of us.”

The demon in the circle studied him quietly, a seriousness about him, his arms crossed over his chest. Raz met his gaze resolutely, despite the pounding in the back of his skull. After a quiet moment or two, Alcor tilted his head to the side and asked,

“ **That’s one nasty curse you’ve had laid on you. Cursing an entire family takes power. Real power. Did the Aquatos curse the Galochios back?** ”

Raz figured a demon like Alcor probably knew the answer to that already but he shook his head anyway, “No. We didn’t. I asked my dad why once, asked him why we shouldn’t curse the people who cursed us. He just scowled at me and said “an eye for an makes the whole world blind”. He was…trying to teach me to be the better man, I guess.” Raz swallowed hard, a sinking sensation in his gut. He felt like a bit like a traitor, doing this, breaking the Psychonaut’s rules.

“ **You’re helping people you care about,** ” Alcor said in a low voice and Raz jumped, startled by the realization that the demon had so easily picked those thoughts out of his mind, “ **If you break a few rules to do it, is it really so terrible? If it saves lives, is it wrong?** ”

“I…”

“ **You want to make a deal with me?** ” Those dark undertones were back and the demon was stretched to his full height again, as if that momentary kindness had been a lapse, “ **You want me to break the Galochio curse on your family?** ”

“Yes.” Raz tilted his chin up, fists clenched at his sides, “Now what will it cost me? I—I have candy. Dream fluffs too, I dunno if you like those but—“

Alcor actually laughed, “ **You _have_ been doing your research! No, kid, it’s going to take a lot more than some sweets for this deal to work.** ”

“Like what? A year off my life?” He went cold as he said it but for his family. For his father. his mother, and his brothers and sisters. He would do it if it meant saving them.

“ **Thought about it. Didn’t like it.** ” Alcor admitted. He drew in a breath and the towering flames of the candles bent in towards him. When he let it out again, they snapped back to pillars of blue fire, “ **I thought of something better. Here’s my offer: I break the curse on your family and in exchange, you come when I call.** ”

“Uh. What?” Raz’s brow furrowed. He hadn’t been expecting that, “What do you mean, like a dog?”

“ **Mmm, something like that.** ” Alcor leaned back in midair, almost relaxing, “ **More like…oh, I would say slave but that’s such a nasty word. Servant, maybe? Oh!** ” He snapped his fingers and sparks shot into the air. The golden pattern on his body shimmered, “ **I got it! Butler! Like a butler!** ”

Raz wrinkled his nose, “And what…would being the butler of the most powerful demon in existence entail? ‘Cause I won’t murder or steal or cause harm to innocents. And I won’t be making any bloody sacrifices for you!”

Alcor’s lip curled, flashing those awful teeth again, “ **I thought you’d studied up on me, Spoonbender. I don’t take living sacrifices.** ” Abruptly he was smiling again, “ **But no, Razputin, I wouldn’t ever do anything against your morals. Just some favors here and there. Maybe some bodyguard duty. Easy stuff for a Psychonaut. It’s not a lot to ask in return for breaking your family’s curse…** ”

Raz considered it carefully. Being at the beck and call of a demon didn’t exactly appeal to him. He also had to think what if he was on a mission for the Psychonauts, what if Alcor called him then? And what could a demon possibly want that didn’t involve death, destruction, or sacrifices?

But he thought about his family and realized he was probably getting a _really good deal_. Especially from someone like Alcor.

The young Psychonaut braced himself with a deep breath and let it out slowly. He thrust his hand out at Alcor, head held high, “All right, Alcor the Dreambender. You’ve got a deal.”

The demon beamed. He reached through the lines of the summoning circle, blue flames springing to life from his palm, and grasped Raz’s hand. The young man flinched, expecting searing heat, and was surprised to find it like a sunny day, even through his gloves. Blue flames wrapped around his wrist and he could feel power digging into his skin, seeping into his blood. It pressed into his skull and his vision blurred, making him stumble, the world shifting as his psychic powers warped and bent underneath Alcor’s own strength.

“ **The deal is sealed.** ” He heard the demon purr and then everything went dark.

When he came to again, the candles were out, Alcor was empty, and there was a scorch mark in the shape of a pine tree on the floor of the empty warehouse.

He quickly packed his things and left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So what was supposed to happen was that Raz ended up babysitting the triplets. Because Dipper is a worrywort and not just anyone can babysit his niblings. Oh no. If he’s got a psychic secret agent on his payroll then he’s damn well going to make use of that.  
> During this wonderful babysitting adventure Raz would learn that weird shit happens in the Pines house that no one blinks an eye at. Then he would get invited to dinner and, wow, what the fuck is Alcor the Dreambender doing eating mashed potatoes. Wait. He’s your brother? Yeah, okay that totally clears up everything.  
> And so on and so forth.  
> I’ll never get around to finishing this but here it is, for your entertainment. Now go play Psychonauts.


	15. Change

Mabel found out the hard way that startling Dipper was not a good idea.

Not a good idea but still hilariously fun.

He’d been in one of his dazed states where he was starring off into the infinite depths of the universe, gathering the winding wool of information that was dumping into his mind, sorting it out and categorizing it all in a way that only Dipper could. He would be like this for hours after recovering from the massive amount of knowledge suddenly accessible to him. And normally he was left alone during these moment because he had a tendency to snap, crackle, pop with energy and shock anyone who got too close.

But today Mabel needed his help.

So she used an expertly made marker chain—caps sticking to the end of the other marks—to prod Dipper in the shoulder from across the room. When that didn’t work she poked him harder. She poked him harder and harder until the marker chain fell apart with a clatter to the floor.

That got his attention.

Dipper jumped and backpedaled in the air, eyes wild and flames spitting from his heels. He tumbled head over heels, coat tails flapping, and slammed into the wall. There was a swirl of bright blue fire and suddenly Dipper was gone.

Instead there was a tiny, shivering ball of blue fire hovering a few inches off the floor.

“Dipper…?” Mabel asked curiously, creeping across the floor, “Did you just—are you a cute little fire ball?”

The blue ball of flames spat sparks and zipped away under the bed. Mabel crouched down on the floor and saw it backed into the corner, still shuddering, and smiled. She was thirteen. Her brother was a cute little ball of fire. She had to smile, it was an obligation.

Later, when she and Stan were in the kitchen, there was a thud and a sharp yelp of pain from upstairs.

Apparently Dipper had returned to normal while he was still under the bed.

 


	16. Spark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did another cross over. Oops.  
> This time it’s with my all time favorite books, the Urban Magic series and the Magical Anonymous series by Kate Griffin. You want contemporary use of magic, look no further. Who needs pentagrams when stop signs have far more power? Fireballs? Please, the sodium neon from streetlights is your fire power now. Dryads live in a lampposts, there are support groups for magical entities, the entire mythological community has adjusted itself to the modern world, it’s amazing I CANNOT PLUG THIS SERIOUS ENOUGH. Seriously guys, for all those people whining about “modernized magic”, I recommend the books a million times over.  
> That being said, it is complicated and I don’t really know how to summarize it understandably in a paragraph. So if you haven’t read them, I don’t know if you’ll understand this well or not, sorry. It was mostly for my own amusement anyway.

\--------

Mabel spontaneously decides one day that they all need a vacation and books them all a flight to Europe. When Dipper argues he could just blip them all there with no airfare or security checks, his twin points out that “blipping” to places takes away from the real quality of the vacation. Dipper wants to keep arguing with her but he doesn’t.

They’ve had a bad month.

So he lets them pack their bags and watches the triplets squeal and throw socks at each other and Henry tries to get them all packed in the most organized manner possible and, no, Grunkle Stan, you cannot take alcohol on the plane, put it back. Dipper is sulking as he watches them go about their business because he remembers (a number that is meaningless) years earlier when he was heavy with gravity and blood and a heartbeat and was struggling to pack for a trip to some backwater place called Gravity Falls. He doesn’t like remembering that.

Mabel catches him pouting near the ceiling and makes a grand and very loud point of telling him that he’s coming too. She promises to summon him the second they land. He says not to bother and that he’ll be quite happy to follow them the whole way there. She considers it. Agrees that it’s all right as long as he doesn’t scare anyone.

He sniffs as she skips away. As if he needed her permission.

——

It should have been obvious that putting the entire Pines family on a plane was a perfect spelling of the word ‘disaster’.

Dipper is trying really, really, _really_ hard not to laugh because he’s pretty sure that would just make Mabel mad at him. But it’s ssoooo hard. Because three teenaged Pines children are a storm and throwing Grunkle Stan in the mix just makes it worse. Dipper’s fairly certain that all the stewardesses are going to quit their jobs the second they land.

When Acacia shoots another peanut out of her nose and manages to land it in the Hank’s water, Dipper knocks down all the luggage in the rack he’s curled in because he’s laughing so hard.

——

London is different than Gravity Falls.

Of course, it’s not like Dipper hasn’t been here before, he’s been yanked around by all sorts of summons from all over the world. But he never really stops too appreciate the places he’s gone to, he’s never really had the time.

Now he’s perched on the balcony rail of Grunkle Stan and Hank’s hotel room (Acacia and Willow are doing “girl things” and Mabel and Henry are…well…Dipper can feel their energy and bliss from here) drinking it all in. Not just the sights but also the magic. It’s different here. It’s neon and ozone and fog, it’s thick and dark, and, somewhere in the back of his mind, he knows he’s being watched by something. Something big. Something huge. It feels as if every eye in the city is directed at him.

Magic evolved differently here. It is not the same. In some ways, Dipper is thinking it might be more dangerous. Something is out there and he doesn’t quite understand what it is and that might frighten him just a bit.

“Uncle Dipper?”

The demon looks around, wings twitching to keep his balance, and Hank is standing there looking jet lagged but awake enough to be worried. Colors swirl and swell around him and Dipper sighs, sliding off the railing.

“I’m all right. I was just watching the city.”

“You were growling…”

“Was I?”

“Yeah, like a mad dog when someone’s in its yard.”

Dipper huffs, puffing himself up, “I am not a dog.”

Hank chuckles, “Sure, Uncle Dipper, I know. Mom calls you a kitty so, you know…”

Dipper pretends he’s not blushing and goes to find out where Grunkle Stan disappeared to.

It turns out the hotel bar doesn’t care what sort of patrons it gets as long as they pay.

——

They’re touring London. Dipper is only half involved in the mild chaos of Henry trying to wrangle his wife who is rallying the triplets who are harassing Stan.

He keeps getting distracted by the feeling of someone watching.

Because, yeah, someone—or something—is definitely watching. Not in a fierce or aggressive or dangerous way, more in a…territorial way. Or curious.

Dipper tastes metal on his teeth and static makes his hair stand on end.

He sniffs the air, finds the heavy stench of spellwork, of electricity, of old blood, and…sandwich meat? The demon sneezes and drifts off in the complete opposite direction of his family. He’s too curious, he can’t help it. Something big is nearby, something deadly and strong and fast and he wants to know what it is.

A man, apparently.

He’s sitting on a bench, alone. He looks homeless. His jeans are ratty, his sneakers are peeling, there are stains on his shirt, and his long brown coat is faded and frayed at the cuffs. His brown hair is scruffy, there’s a tired look about him, his worn fingers draped over the tattered shoulder bag in his lap, and spotty stubble scratching at his jaw. But his eyes are a sharp and bright neon blue.

“Staring is rude, you know.” Says the man in the trench coat and Dipper jumps, backpedaling because this stranger is _looking right at him_.

“You…can see me.” Dipper ventures, composing himself as best he can, still hovering in the air above the sidewalk. People are walking through him but he doesn’t pay them mind, “You have the Sight?”

“In a manner of speaking,” The man replies, smirking like he’s made a joke, “Actually, I’m a sorcerer. Judging by the looks of you, though, that probably means something different where you come from. And you can sit down, we don’t bite.” He indicates the bench beside him.

Dipper squints at him, watching colors twist around him, and then sinks onto the bench beside the man. They judge one another quietly.

“I am Alcor the Dreambender.” Dipper says, nose in the air, chest puffed out, dignified in his dark suit.

“Matthew Swift.” Says the man, “I’ve heard stories about you. I think you may have had a cult somewhere around here but no one’s seen them in a while.”

“I ate their souls.” Dipper replies casually and he’s a little disappointed that Matthew doesn’t look the least bit terrified, “Was that you watching me? I’ve felt it since I got here, something is watching me.”

“Oh, no, that’s just London.” Matthew looks away, back out into the street, “It’s a dragon.”

“Oh.”

That didn’t really answer anything.

“It’s just…wary of you. You have a lot of power. We could sense it the moment you entered our city.”

Dipper frowns. He feels like he’s missing something every time Matthew speaks.

“We like your blue fire,” Matthew is still speaking, leaning back against the bench, “It burns very brightly, not as bright as us though. I’m kind of curious about what you can do—don’t get any ideas I have no intention of asking you to do anything demonic. I don’t want to foot the bill for that. I just—“

“You’re saying “we” when you mean “I”.” Dipper points out abruptly, “And you’re not possessed. What the hell are you?”

Matthew looks bored. Actually he looks like someone who was trying to ignore something only to have it thrust into their faces regardless of how well they tried to hide it. He scowls at Dipper and then scrubs a hand under his nose. The edges of his fingerless gloves are fraying and Dipper catches a whiff of blood and swears he sees a trail of blue sparks.

“Honestly, I just want to have a conversation and make new friends with people who _don’t_ pry.” The sorcerer sulks, “But I suppose since the world went _boom_ that’s a bit too much to ask.” He settles back in his seat, looking Dipper square in the eye,

“I am sorcerer. We are also, incidentally, the Midnight Mayor, the protector of the city walls, and I am the blue electric angels, the fire in the wire, the song in the telephones. We are me and I am us. Does that clear things up for you?”

Dipper considers. He observes. Hears _come be we be free_ in Matthew’s lungs, sees the dragon of London in his shadow, tastes electricity in the air around him. He grins.

“Yeah, that about clears it up. You don’t look very…Midnight Mayor-ish, though, just sayin’.”

“And you don’t act very demonic.”

Dipper laughs.

When he finds his family again they all clamor and fuss about where he went off to. Dipper tells them his curiosity just got the better of him. Hank makes some snide remarks about cats. Dipper makes a very localized rainstorm fall on his nephew. They laugh.

Later, in the middle of the night, when they’re all asleep and he can taste their dreams floating lazily around at the edges of his senses. Later, when the sky is lost in smears of clouds and fog and the street lamps are buzzing yellow-orange across the pavement. Later, when things slow down and most of the city is asleep, Dipper is crouched on the roof of the hotel, watching.

He thinks he sees a great, black, boiling shadow that could be described as a dragon rise over the tops of the buildings.

But then he blinks and it’s gone.

He tastes ozone and sparks.

And he smiles.

This city is safe.

It has someone to protect it.

And they have brighter wings than he.


	17. Stitch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't forgotten about this, I still have a handful of one shots to post. I just have no idea what's going on in the Transcendence AU anymore so I just kind of. Left this alone for a while. Sorry.

When they were kids, she’d made him sweaters that he’d worn begrudgingly on the cold days and only when all his other warm clothes were in the wash.

Now that he was ageless and she was not, he practically begged sweaters from her (but he never actually begged because he was a demon and demons did not beg for anything, they simply took).

On their (her’s, really, it was just her’s at this point) sixteenth birthday, she made matching sweet sixteen sweaters that sparkled and were bedazzled and clattered with too many beads. He wore it because it was heavy and he was weightless and it felt like her.

When she started dating Henry, she made them both sweaters that said “If Found Return to Mabel”. Then she proudly wore one that said “I Am Mabel” and called them her boys.

One day he came back from a summons, grumpy and dragging thunder clouds with him. She gave him a sweater with an angry frown on the front that said “POUTY MCPOUT FACE”. He wore it whenever he was in a bad mood.

When Waddles died, he made (snapped into existence with his near infinite powers) her a sweater that read “you done good pig”. She cried into it for hours and told him it didn’t count because he didn’t make it by hand. He said he snapped his fingers so that totally counted. She laughed and cried snotty tears and hugged him.

She made a dozen sweaters while she was pregnant with the triplets. None of them were for him. A week after they were born, she handed him one that said “World’s Best Demon Uncle” on it and he never wanted to take it off.

The ones that made his parents go white and Grunkle Stan frown at him said “I Nearly Died and All I Got For it Were These Stupid Demon Powers”.

One of his favorites was “Voldemort’s Got Nothing On Me”.

When he started making deals for treats, for sugar and ice cream, for his favorite sweets, Mabel laughed at him. Next week she shoved a sweater over his head and when he looked at it he had to laugh too because the words “WILL WORK FOR CANDY” were wrapped around a lollipop and it was funny and it was from her.

But his all time favorite sweater, the one he always came back to, the one that he loved with every ounce of his being, was the one she made for him one snowy, holiday season. In the light, it shimmered like freshly fallen snow and in the dark it glowed a soft blue-green.

The constellation of his namesake followed him everywhere and he couldn’t be happier for it.

 


	18. Trash

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for this I regret everything

When the triplets started referring to Mabel as Dipper’s “moirail”, he got understandably curious.

He was omnipotent, practically omnipresent, could see the past, present, and future all at once if he so desired, could twist the world to his whims with a flick of his wrist. And he had no idea what that word meant.

Nor did he understand “kismesis” or “sburb” or why his niblings were suddenly screeching “CAW CAW MOTHER FUCKERS!” to the heavens and brandishing sticks or tools from Soos’ toolbox (and how the hell had they _gotten their hands on the fucking chainsaw!?_ ).

So, in all his profound and infinite wisdom, Dipper Pines decided to investigate.

Whether this was a mistake or not no one was quite sure.

Because on one hand, Alcor the Dreambender was suddenly getting _very_ creative with how he appeared in his summons (there had been rumors of plush dragons dropping down liked hanged men from the rafters of one particular summoning). But on the other hand he was becoming an insufferable nuisance to anyone who actually _knew him_.

Stan swore that if he heard Dipper shout “PCHOOOO!” one more _goddamn time_ then he was going to personally ward the shack against him.

Henry, poor Henry, was trying his damnedest to stay out of the whole affair. And yet somehow he found himself in the woods one day in bedsheet cape with a stick in his hand and his children swarming around his feet and Dipper laughing in the branches overhead.

At first, Mabel had gone along with it and made god tier sweaters for everyone and had laughed and played and joined in the fun. But there was a limit and Dipper started pushing it when he started leaving animals heads all over the yard.

Sometimes he just got too excited.

And then came the incident that would be referred to as “The Act Six Disaster”.

The end result was the entire town painted in a variety of rainbow colors, people lying stunned or traumatized in the streets, children crying, power outages across a quarter of the state, and a meteor shower that peppered two counties.

Alcor the Dreambender was not seen for several weeks.

When he returned, his summonings were back to normal (or as normal as his summons would get) and he spoke not a word of what had happened to his family.

The triplets lost their internet privileges for a month.

When they got it back, they swore off webcomics and went outside to play instead.


	19. Dragon

Anger didn’t cover it.

Rage didn’t cover it.

There wasn’t a single word in any known language that could describe the white-hot burning that flowed through his body.

Body?

Was it a body?

It felt like everything.

It felt like strength and fire and burning and hatred and an anger so deep and so festering that it was poison to everything it touched. And he didn’t care because he _wanted_ to feel like this. He wanted it to hurt and he wanted to throw it in the faces of those who had made him feel like this.

Throw it in their faces like so much boiling acid and watch them wither and melt away, screaming and clawing and begging.

Begging.

Begging like they were now. On their knees, cowering, crying, hands in the air as they pleaded for their lives. He sneered, multiple mouths peeling back lips of sparking energy to show needle teeth made of gold, brass, iron, sharper than the air itself. He was beast, he was hellfire, he was rage, he was death, and he was pissed as hell.

He was Alcor the fucking Dreambender! The Twin Star! King of Nightmares and Lord of Dreams! Who the hell were they!?

Scum. Mortals. Sick. Trash. Disgusting. Wretched. Monsters. Filth. Wrong. Puny. Weak. Pathetic. Dirt. Worms. Dust.

How dare they.

**How dare they.**

His voice roared, splintered, made the air boil. Words cracked the walls, made ears pop and bleed, made the weak fleshy things before him cry harder and gasp for air. Claws raised sparks against the floor, broke open fissures in the world to let the stench of decay flow up from the hell below. Golden light, molten in its shimmering glory, flowed down his twisting body, pooling in the places were shadows should have been and making the room burn. The very stars of the universe boiled in his belly, magma dripped from his jaws, the stuff of nightmares leeching from his eyes.

No one had ever seen him like this before and no one would live to tell of it.

Oh, no, these vermin would live. But they would wish they could die. After what they had done, they would wish with everything they were that they could be given the quiet piece of death.

But he wouldn’t let them.

And really, at this point, death was probably the least of their worries.


	20. Fear

“Oh god oh god ohgodohgodohgod!”

“Shhhh! Shut up, I’m trying to concentrate!”

“It was right there though! It was _right there_!”

“Shut up!” Mabel hissed, leaning forward in her seat and frowning at the computer screen. Behind her, Dipper was hovering in the air, anxiously gnawing on his claws, tiny wings trembling at his lower back.

They were in the newly furnished attic of the Shack, hunched around the computer Soos had gotten them from their seventeenth birthday. And Mabel had decided to play a horror game.

“I can’t believe you’re actually scared of this,” Mabel scoffed, carefully maneuvering around a corner and waving the light into the dark shadows ahead, “I mean, you’re a _demon_. Do you know how silly you’re being, Dips?”

“Hey! Demons can be scared too!” Dipper snapped, looking pale, his shoulders hunched to his ears, “Just ‘cause I see all doesn’t mean I like it all!”

“Baby.” Mabel muttered and clicked door in the game to open it.

There was a hideous howl from the monster that lunged from the darkness.

“OHGODIT’SRIGHTHERERUN!!OHFUCKJUSTRUNMABEL!!”

Mabel let out a squealing shriek and whipped the character around and sent them running in the opposite direction.

When she had found a safe zone not seconds later, she collapsed back in her seat with breathless, nervous laughter, “Haha, wow, I did not see that coming. You screamed like a little girl, Dipper. …Dipper?”

When she turned around in her chair, she saw her brother drifting listlessly through the air, his face ashen and his eyes closed.

He had fainted.


	21. Doom

The creaking of the old building woke Mabel up in the dead of night and that confused her because the house was always creaky and always making noises as it settled onto its old foundations and it had never bothered her before. It took her a few minutes of laying in the dark, half asleep, to realize that this creaking was not the usual sounds of the house. The walls were literally groaning, the house trembling, shudders warping the wooden beams.

Mabel hefted herself up and reached over to flip on the bedside lamp. Beside her, Henry groaned and curled deeper under the blankets, shoving his face in the pillow. Mabel ignored him and swung her legs out of bed, pushing her hair back from her face.

Another tremor made the walls creak and Mabel leaned back on the bed to shake her husband,

“Henry. Henry, wake up.”

“Mhng. No.”

“Henry, I think something’s wrong with Dipper.”

That got him up. Henry shifted, pulling himself up groggily, hair sticking up in every direction, and rubbed sleep out of his eyes. He tilted his head back, frowning at the walls of their bedroom. They appeared to be bending in, groaning and creaking like they were about to snap in half and collapse.

Mabel was already on her feet, heading for the door. Henry swung himself out of bed and trudged after her. They found Stan sticking his head out the door, sleep still clinging to the corners of his eyes. He took one look at Mabel’s face and followed them down the stairs.

The sitting room was a nightmare.

The shadows were thick and sometimes they seemed to shift as if something was hiding inside them. The walls were dripping dark, glistening substance; in the gloom it was hard to tell but it was probably blood given the raw iron stench permeating the room. That wasn’t even mentioning the vague, dark whispers and faint wailing coming from nowhere and everywhere all at once.

And in the center of it all was Dipper.

He was curled into a tiny ball on the floor, viscid black ooze dripping from his form and staining the carpet. His fingers were knotted into his hair, his eyes shut as bloody tears streaked down his face, pained whimpers coming from between clenched fangs. A tremor occasionally ran through his body and the house mimicked it, groaning and shaking and sending tiny trickles of dust from the ceiling.

Henry reached out automatically to flip the light switch. When nothing happened, he flicked it a couple more times anyway and then looked helplessly at Stan.

“Dipper?” Mabel said his name softly, carefully, inching across the floor like it was a mine field, “Dipper, bro, are you all right? What happened?” Dipper shuddered again and Mabel felt the floor ripple beneath her feet. But he didn’t move and he didn’t answer her. She looked back over her shoulder at the two men,

“Grunkle Stan, go make some coffee. And warm up some of those cookies I made this morning. Henry, go get me a blanket, the big thick one that’s still in the linen closet.” She turned back to Dipper, worry etched on her features, “I think he’s had another one of his info dumps. And it looks like it was a bad one…”

The men obeyed without question. Dipper’s info dumps had been few and far between as time had worn on. But when they did hit, they hit him hard. And depending on what he saw, he could go catatonic for weeks at a time dealing with all of it. During those times, his family did their best to take care of him and work around whatever was being affected in reality.

It was several hours later when Dipper finally calmed down and slowly rose out of his dribbling state of existence. By that time, the carpet had turned black with ooze, dust was layered over everything, the walls were starting to warp, and the whole house stank of blood. He uncurled from the floor, blanket draped over his body, and looked around blearily.

Mabel crouched down beside him and he blinked, trying to focus, “Hey, Dips, you doing okay?”

“Nhg.” Said Dipper and leaned against her, closing his eyes and taking deep breaths, “Sorry ‘bout the house. I’ll clean it up.”

“Later, kid,” Stan grunted, “Right now just get your strength back. Here. Cookies and coffee. Just sit there and relax for a bit.”

Dipper’s hands were shaking but he took the offered mug and small plate of cookies all the same. Someone tucked the blanket around him better as he shifted into a sitting position and he looked around to see Henry smiling at him rather lopsidedly,

“You gave us a quite the scare. Take it easy for a bit. This can wait until you’re feeling better.”

Dipper swallowed a sip of coffee, pushing it past the lump in his throat, and leaned heavily against his sister. Mabel looped her arm around his shoulder and squeezed. Henry sat down on his other side, both of them ignoring how the black stuff seeped into their pajamas, and Stan flicked the television on almost out of habit.

Then the four of them sat in blood stained, lopsided house and watched b-movies and shared coffee and cookies until dawn started creeping over the treetops.


	22. Fade

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These last few are the last ones I ever wrote. Maybe one day I will write more. But for now, this is all I have for the Scrapbook. Thanks for all the comments and the kudos and sticking with this, guys, you're all awesome :]

“What’s with that stupid look on your face, bro-bro?”

Dipper looked up from where he was pawing through the crayons floating in the air around him like a miniature galaxy. Mabel was stretched out on her bed in the attic of the Mystery Shack, papers and coloring books all over the bedspread around her. She had her chin in her hand, her other occupied by a crayon, and she was giving Dipper a scrutinizing once-over.

“What stupid look?” Dipper asked, leaning back in mid-air and crossing his legs, looking for all the world as if he were lounging on someone’s porch in the summer time, “I don’t have a stupid look. You have as stupid look.”

Mabel stuck her tongue out at him, “Nuh-uh! You look like that time you had beets! Like you have a gross in your mouth!”

Dipper hummed and started to aggressively color his drawing, not looking at his twin. The coat tails of his suit fluttered behind him like a couple of tails and his top hat sat cock-eyed in the air above his head. He still looked twelve, his face young and round, but his black and gold eyes seemed distant.

“Hey, don’t ignore me!” A crayon bounced off his head. He ignored it. Mabel huffed at him, “Diiippeeerrrrr! We’re supposed to be drawing holiday cards! You’d better not be drawing some kind of awful demon card thing! We’re supposed to be doing FAMILY THINGS!” She screeched this last part at him and it startled him so much he tumbled head over heels through the air.

When he finally stopped spinning he was upside down, clutching his paper to his chest, eyes wide, legs tucked up against his body and his coat tails dangling over his head. Mabel took one look at him and burst out laughing. Dipper’s cheeks turned red and he rightened himself with a huff.

“I am so doin’ family things…” He grumbled, smoothing out his suit and then his crinkled paper, “You’re the one who keeps asking me deep questions about the universe.”

“Hey!” Mabel rocketed off the bed, scattering papers and crayons, “You know, like, all the secrets of the universe now right!? IS SANTA CLAUS FOR REAL!?”

“I—“

“DIPPER THIS IS IMPORTANT!”

“Mabel, that’s not how it—“

“I NEED TO KNOW!”

Dipper hesitated, staring at his wild-eyed sister, and then sighed, shoulders slumping, “Yeah, okay, he might be real. Sort of. In a way.”

Mabel let out a scream of delight and fell back on her bed, kicking her feet in the air and rolling around on the papers and blankets. Dipper watched her with a quiet bemusement, hovering in the air with his legs crossed,

“Mabel, you’re going to raise the dead with that screaming, calm down.”

“NEVER!” Mabel screeched and flung herself at Dipper, tackling him out of the air. They both fell back onto Dipper’s old bed and Dipper let out a shout, struggling to get out from underneath his sister. She pinned him down and started tickling him, laughing as he shrieked and batted at her, trying to get away.

They were both laughing, kicking and squealing on the bed spread, tangled in Dipper’s coattails, tears of laughter streaking down their cheeks. Finally, gasping and chuckling with the last vestiges of their mirth, they collapsed onto the bedsheets beside each other.

Mabel rolled onto her side to see her twin grinning up at the ceiling, “Hey Dipper?”

“Yeah Mabel?”

“I think that was the first time in a forever you’ve let me tickle you.”

Dipper thought about it, “Yeah. I guess it was.”

“Why’d you let me do it?”

Dipper fell quiet, staring at the ceiling, his gaze beyond the ceiling now. There was a small silence between them for a while and then, in a very soft, very small voice, Dipper said,

“I wanted to feel you touch me again.”

Then he blinked and the scene blurred. It went fuzzy on the edges and began to smear together, becoming paint-like smears that eventually drizzled away. When it had all faded, it revealed a deep, dense forest of towering pines and heavy shadows. Dipper, older, aged, his top hat gone and wings twitching at his lower back, was lying in midair above the forest floor, his black and golden eyes—now ageless and older than the trees around him—starred up into the starry sky above him.

Something squeaked by his ear and he turned his head slowly. A little, rectangular, black creature with tiny wings and a bright golden eye was hovering at his shoulder. He smiled thinly and reached out to cup his hand around it.

“Thank you for the memory, little friend.” He said in a soft, hoarse voice, raw from something that might have laughter but also might have been crying, “Thank you for your effort. Thank you. Thank you.”

He wrapped his hands around the little creature, curling his entire floating body around it, repeating his gratitude over and over and over again. Even when his voice began to shake and storm clouds rumbled in the distance, he continued to mumble to the little thing in his hands.

He stayed that way for a long time.

 


	23. Silver

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not particularly fond of this one but, eh, I figured I'd share it anyway.

Dipper was sitting on the roof of the house, listening to the dreams of his family below and occasionally nudging them away from becoming nightmares. His black and golden eyes drifted over the stars (and sometimes beyond them) counting, recounting, and mingling stardust with the sweet tastes of dreams when it suited his fancy.

A flicker of light caught his attention and he turned his head to see a star streaking across the sky. He frowned, trying to figure out which star had decided to fall, and in doing so it took him a while to realize that the star was not a star at all as it did not taste of ice and fire and space dust. The demon’s hackles raised and his wings spread wide, a hiss escaping from between his sharp teeth as he straightened up, not taking his eyes off the not-star.

The not-star drew closer, a searing white-hotness to it that burned the back of his throat like hot sauce. Dipper steeled himself, fists clenched, feeling his own blue fire swelling in his veins. The not-star stopped at the edge of the roof, swelled, became misshapen, and finally the light cleared to reveal what it actually was.

A humanoid figure that seemed to be constructed of crystal and bronze was hovering at the edge of the roof. It had three pairs of wings spreading from its back; two were keeping it aloft with steady beats, two were spread wide over its head, and the third pair were swept down to cover its feet. It was an angel and Dipper cringed away from it automatically, another hiss of dislike bubbling from his throat.

“Alcor the Dreambender.” The angel’s voice was a roar, a clanging of bells. No so much words as intent, sound given feeling, a sensation the reverberated in Dipper’s chest and made his core ache.

“That’s my name, don’t wear it out.” Dipper couldn’t help the snark in his voice or the sneer that twisted his lips and bared his teeth, “What do you want?”

“Impudence.” The angel said distastefully, “You should grovel at our feet, demon. Be gracious that we have let you speak at all. You are filth to us.”

“Wow, thanks, that makes me feel _so_ much better about the fact that I lost my humanity while trying to save the world.”

The angel paused and Dipper sniffed, backing up a bit, putting some distance between them. He wasn’t looking for a fight and he wasn’t sure if he could defeat the angel anyway. When nothing happened, he ventured a question,

“So. Uh. Are you here to, like, kill me or whatever?”

He felt eyes on him though he couldn’t see the angel’s face through bruise purple feathers,

“Ridiculous. That was our original intent. But we have observed. We have watched. We do not think you mean harm as your…brethren do.”

Dipper twitched, brow furrowing at being categorized with the other demons. Lesser beings, so much weaker than he. Pathetic, groveling beasts that would tremble at the mere mention of the Twin Star and—no, no. That wasn’t why it bothered him, no. The dream demon shivered, flexing his own wings,

“Then why are you here?” He asked in a steady voice, tilting his chin up. He kept a careful ear to the house, knowing the more sensitive of the household could very well be awaken by the goings-on. The thought of his family suddenly left a cold pit in his stomach and he momentarily panicked, “Not to…not to take…you can’t be though. It’s not…their time isn’t…even Mabel—“

“Peace, Dreambender. We will be taking nothing from you this evening.” The angel raised an arm, wrappings of silk cascading over crystal, and held out a sword to Dipper, “We only came to offer.”

Dipper stared down at the sword. It was a gorgeous thing; a two-handed broadsword with a blade of such pure silver it might have been made of moonlight. Dipper sniffed, smelled the stardust and light on it, and sneezed.

“What in the world do I need a Heavenly Weapon for?” He asked, rubbing at his nose.

“Use more than your fire to guard your family.” The angel explained, “Use this. Use a sword of Heaven. And if we were to call you, answer with sword in hand and do our bidding. We have need of your heart, Child of the Pines.”

The demon in the black suit snorted and shook his head, backing away from the sword with his hands raised, “Nope. No thanks. I mean, that’s a really cool sword and I bet Mabel would _freak_ over it and I have no doubts in my mind what the niblets would think. But no, I can’t.” He sighed, sinking back down onto the roof to look at the stars again, letting the dreams of his loved ones tangle in the back of his mind,

“I’m already bound to serve someone. A lot of someone’s. And if they call, I will always answer. Sorry man, but if I didn’t come when Mabel called…heh, I don’t even want to think about it.”

There was a flutter of wings and when Dipper looked again, the angel was gone. The dream demon stared at the spot where it had been for a while and then leaned back, stretching out completely on the rooftop.

“Could I be regretting it? Maybe a little bit?” He raised his hand, reaching for the constellation of his namesake, tops of his claws brushing the familiar stars. Then he smiled and let his arm fall over his eyes,

“Nah. Of all the things I regret in this world, putting them first isn’t even on the list.”


	24. Teeth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for graphic violence (as in guts, breaking bones, LOTS of blood, copious amounts of body horror, and really awful things done to really awful people), torture, child abuse, and one very, very angry demon.

There was no bang. No smoke, no fire, no flicker, no eerie voices, no lightning. None of the usual theatrics that generally accompanied the summoning of Alcor the Dreambender.

In fact, Alcor the Dreambender wasn’t even the one who showed up in the middle of the cultist’s summoning circle.

It was a _child_.

A boy—maybe ten or eleven years old—had appeared in the ring of flickering candles, all noodley limbs and skinned knees. His brown hair was stuffed underneath a peeling trucker hat, his shorts were frayed at the hems, his red t-shirt was faded, and his vest was deflated, stuffing poking from holes worn into the fabric. His feet were bare and scratched, his hands worn, his elbows bruised. He stared at the six cult members quietly, eyes empty, head canted ever so slightly to the left.

There was a tense staring match for a while. And then the child spoke and everyone got a chill down their spines,

“ **You must be new.** ” His voice was dark and deep, far deeper than a child’s should have been, “ **Didn’t you read my Wiki page? I’m pretty sure it says something on there about sacrifices…** ”

“We, ah…” One of the cultists wheezed, swallowed, and tried to start again, “We are actually, um, The High Cult of—“

“ **I don’t care who you are,** ” The boy said in a bored voice, picking at his dirty fingernails, “ **And I really don’t care about your stupid rivalry with the guys who worship the same low level demon scumbag as you and, frankly, do it a lot better than you do.** ” He turned his gaze back on the cult and all of them flinched away. The child’s eyes were black and gold and there was a furious fire behind them, “ **What I care about is that innocent kid you just killed.** ”

He pointed to the small, lifeless body curled in a nearby circle. The pool of blood soaking into the clothes was still very wet. Every member of the cult looked around at the body. Then they looked back at the boy—not a boy, Alcor, it had to be Alcor.

And Alcor was looking decidedly unhappy.

“ **I don’t know why I have to keep explaining this to you asshats,** ” The child formed Dreambender hissed through sharp teeth. Despite his increasingly demonic appearance, he had his hands in the pockets of his shorts as if this were nothing more than a casual stroll through the park, “ **It should be clear to everyone by now. I don’t. Like. Living. Sacrifices. _Especially_ if they’re children. No one ever has the right to take the life of another. You pathetic, crawling, lowly, mortals don’t get to decide who lives and who dies!** ” A bright blue flame in the shape of a pine tree appeared on his trucker hat, casting strange shadows across his face,

“ **Really that’s something you probably should have left to the professional.** ” A shark toothed grin, dangerous, dark, and very old, “ **But that being said, the energy boost you fools gave me with that sacrifice will be your undoing. I’ll give that child a chance for revenge. I will be his conduit. You will suffer his agony through me.** ”

“N-no, hold on—we didn’t know!”

“Please! Mercy!”

“Wait, please! We didn’t mean—!”

“ **S I L E N C E!** ” Alcor’s voice boomed from everywhere, the entire room shaking and making some of the cult members stumble and fall to their knees. The little boy in the circle still had his hands in his pockets, a smirk on his face, his head tilted back in a smug manner.

He looked less like a weak and lost child now and more like a dangerous, feral street animal.

“ **Now, let us begin.** ” He raised his hand and all the cultists suddenly found themselves dangling in the air, pinned there by an invisible force. They struggled, trying to break free, terrified for their lives, some of them began to cry. Alcor rolled his eyes and, still in the form of a tattered child, stepped over the edge of the summoning circle and approached the six people in robes,

“ **Let’s start from the left. It seems the most logical place to begin.** ”

Alcor twirled his finger and the cult member on the left end of the line screamed. There was the sound of crunching bones, the man’s robes buckled. Muscles and flesh tore as bones were stretched and bent and torn like putty. One of the other members wretched and threw up. Alcor let the ruined body of the man he’d been torturing drop to the floor in a bloody mess that was no longer even human.

The demon turned to the next cultist who began blubbering and pleading. The Dreambender only smiled coldly and snapped his fingers. The woman’s voice gurgled and she gagged. At first it seemed as though nothing was happening. Then her robes slowly began to fill out more, then to bulge, then to stretch. She gasped and gurgled and groaned, limbs bloating into thick sausages, seams of her clothing stretching and tearing as she continued to swell.

The end result was messy and two of the remaining cultists were sick. Alcor, undaunted and now splattered with all manner of bits and pieces of the former cultist, turned to the rest of his victims.

One of them was sewn with barbed wire. Very slowly. Another melted away, feeling every agonizing second as their entire body liquified into a puddle on the floor. Rats leisurely chewed the fifth member alive.

He was still screaming when Dipper turned to the last remaining cult member. The leader. He’d saved her for last on purpose.

“ **I know you’re just small, ignorant, stupid humans,** ” The demon said, licking blood from his lips, still in a child’s body, “ **But really, this is getting a bit ridiculous. By now all of you should know better than to try to summon me with blood. You just pay for it with your own. So, how do you feel having watched all your friends die?** ”

The cult leader whimpered helplessly.

“ **Mmm, yeah, that’s what I thought. Anyway, I was thinking about letting you stay alive. Not out of mercy but because I want you to understand why what you did was so terrible.** ” Alcor was grinning, too many tiny sharp teeth in a child’s mouth, “ **I know this was your idea. Killing a kid, I mean. You know when people say that I like kids, they mean that I like making friends with them. Not eating them. I’m getting really tired of explaining this.** ” The little boy tilted his head back, looking the cult leader up and down, his hands on his hips,

“ **So I think I’m going to make an example of you. I’ve been wanting to try something lately so you’re going to be my lab rat. And if something goes wrong, hey, no skin off my back.** ”

The Dreambender raised his hands, black claws tipping his fingers now, his ears pointed. The flaming pine tree on his hat was casting a strange shadow behind him. It looked look a many horned monster with massive wings. The cult leader was sobbing with fear. Alcor was humming, swaying back and forth, eyes glowing with a dark merriment, humming a tune that no one knew.

No one heard from that particular cult again.

But there were stories, terrifying stories, of wraiths and ghosts that wandered the area. Stories of a man sewn together with barbed wire, of another that was missing chunks of flesh and was constantly followed by ghostly rats.

The worst story by far was the one of the little girl in a cult leader’s robes. She was said to have no eyes and could only drag herself along the ground with her arms as she had no legs. They said that she was constantly crying for mercy, constantly shouting out a warning to stay away from the children.

Constantly begging Alcor the Dreambender for forgiveness.


	25. Boredum

Dipper was a demon.

Sometimes it was easy to forget that.

Other times it was really, really hard to forget.

And then there were the times when no one was sure what to think at all. Sometimes the distinction between ‘Alcor’ and ‘Dipper’ was lost somewhere in the limbo of ‘what the fuck’. (Mabel would never say it out loud but these moments tended to remind her a bit too much of a certain triangular plague that had ruined their lives far too many times to count.)

These were the moments when Dipper got a little antsy, when he got a little fidgety, when he had to do _something_ or by god he was going to explode. Something twisted, something dark, something distinctly demonic.

Like gluing quarters to sidewalks.

The sheer amount of pleasure he got from watching people walk by, notice a quarter, try to pick it up, fail, and then shuffle off in embarrassment and hoping no one had noticed was stupid. Peals of laughter would shiver through him and make the structures around him tremble slightly.

The best ones were the ones that tried to pick it up, failed, and then _kept trying_. They kept tugging at it like by their sheer willpower it would be released from its concrete love with the sidewalk. Those people made him cry molten tears of golden fire. Those people were why a couple of alleys in Gravity Falls had tiny scorch marks from demon tears on the pavement.

Dipper didn’t usually share these escapades with anyone. They were like snarky little secrets, pranks and practical jokes (not all of them as tame or as nice as gluing quarters to sidewalks) that only he knew about and it thrilled him to no end. Sometimes he would sit back and wonder if this an okay thing to be doing. But it wasn’t like he was _hurting_ anybody and the worst that had happened was that one guy who had spun out in his car and T-boned it into a lamp post.

Gluing quarters to sidewalks was a perfectly acceptable form of demonic activity.

Besides it was _fun_.

And that was the important part.


	26. Small Things

They’re laughing in the shade of an umbrella in front of the ice cream parlor. It’s bright and it’s hot and it’s sunny and it’s perfect and they all love it. Mabel is four months pregnant and halfway through her second milkshake (and seriously where does she put it all?). Henry is idly stirring his sundae into a pudding mess of chocolate syrup, vanilla and strawberry ice cream, and tiny chunks of peanuts in the bowl and doesn’t seem to care all that much. Dipper is hunkered down in his chair, licking the last of his ice cream from his fingers and occasionally trying to dip said fingers into other peoples’ frozen treats.

He’s corporeal for the moment (a deal made for ice cream) and he’s trying to pretend people aren’t doing double takes as they walk by. Most of Gravity Falls knows him but the occasional tourist can’t help but stare.

Is that Alcor the Dreambender? Eating ice cream? _In a Hawaiian print shirt and Bermuda shorts and flip flops_!?

Yes, puny mortals, yes it is.

And if you keep staring, Alcor the Dreambender will give you more than a black and gold glare.

He knows how to tie intestines into pretty bows.

While they’re still inside you.

So for the most part, their little family is left alone (they tried to invite Grunkle Stan but he muttered something about “letting you kids have your giggly fun times” and went to take a nap).

Henry seems utterly enraptured with Mabel today. He can’t take his eyes off her. It’s probably why his ice cream is more like soup now. Chunky soup, there are bits of nuts floating in it. Dipper eyes them hungrily but when he reaches out to stick his fingers in, Henry whacks his hand with the plastic spoon. Dipper withdraws, sulking, deterred but not beaten.

Mabel is telling a story about when she and Dipper were kids. Not about them specifically since Dipper tends to get all weird and moody when someone reminds him how he used to be all human instead of mostly demon. It’s stories they heard as kids, stories about other kids, stories about suburban life, urban legends and tall tales and things they grew up on.

Henry nods and makes some sort of “uh-huh” noise and Mabel giggles at him. Dipper makes a gagging sounds and Mabel flings a chunk of milkshake at him. He catches it in his mouth and grins slyly at her.

She makes fun of his outfit.

He whines that she asked him to wear it.

Henry gives up on his ice cream and gets up to throw it away.

Dipper snaps it into his hands and drinks it in one gulp.

Mabel calls him fat.

Dipper retorts with “look who’s talking”.

Henry throws his spoon at him.

And then they’re laughing again and the sunlight is catching in little globules all around Dipper and the air is fizzy with energy.

And later, when it’s dark and it’s quiet and Dipper is sitting on the roof watching the stars and listening to the dreams of his family, he will think of this moment and smile.

It’s the little things he loves the most.


End file.
